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Focus on Frankford: Jennifer Mohr

Frankford Crafter Entrepreneur

Originally published on www.destinationfrankford.comIMG_5215 web

One sunny afternoon in October of 2012, I first met Jennifer Mohr at Overington Park  surrounded by children at the Fall Festival.  She was there volunteering with the Friends of Overington Park.  She sat at a table full of handcrafted jewelry and other things for sale. That kind of piqued my curiosity. I was surprised that this relatively young girl was out selling her own creations.

A graduate of Frankford Friends School and the Charter School for Architecture and Design (CHAD), she has been making and designing things almost her entire life.  CHAD seems like the perfect choice for someone who is creative.  It’s located on 7th street between Market and Chestnut in downtown Philadelphia.

Although she is now a Frankford resident, she actually grew up all over the northeast but mainly lived in Mayfair.  She spent a lot of time in Frankford with her aunt Lorraine. When she was looking for a place to live, Frankford came to mind because of the convenience for travel and also because she is comfortable here.  She says it’s not the best neighborhood yet but it certainly has a lot of potential and is affordable.  She doesn’t have a car yet, so the Frankford Transpiration Center is a great asset since you can get to almost any part of the city very easily.  She works full time in Northern Liberties.

On any first Friday of the month, you are likely to find her down around 2nd and Market Street between 5 and 9 PM.  The Old City Arts Association has been sponsoring First Friday in Old City since 1991.  Although the sidewalk vendors are not an official part of the event, they are not discouraged either.  The streets are filled with vendors selling everything and anything to the strollers who come out to tour the numerous art galleries.

It’s a perfect marketplace for her creations which are mainly silver jewelry, decorated boxes and crocheted items like hats and bags.  She is looking to get into candle making which is a very marketable line of business although it does require some new equipment.

She has also marketed her pieces at other vendors markets around the city and is in considering marketing on Etsy.  That is a marketplace for creative people from all around the world to sell their own hand crafted goods.

Jennifer is another example of the many creative residents in Frankford.  We’ve previously highlighted Nasifah Lewis and Flossy Stanowski who both built successful small businesses here.

She has aspirations to open a craft/coffee shop at some point in the future.  She is off to a good start, so that does not seem at all out of reach and we hope that the Frankford Avenue business corridor will be ready for it when she decides to take the plunge.